By CHRIS PACKHAM

Star sticks fork in downtown, determines undoneness: Kansas City deserves a "pat on the back" for its downtown Renaissance. Yes, I said "Renaissance," with all the lutes, pantaloons and attention-hungry repertory theater hopefuls that implies. Ten years ago, what did you see when you drove through downtown Kansas City? It looked like someone had dropped a bomb on 1950, a year notable for its white supremacy and its Alger Hiss perjury conviction. Truly embarrassing. I hope nobody from a nicer city noticed.

The Kansas City Star ranked a number of cities with downtown reurbanization projects and Kansas City was smack in the middle according to the experts they spoke with, including expert Terry Dunn, who is an expert at being president of JE Dunn Construction Group. The Star is the best at reporting! I was totally shocked to hear that the president of a commercial general contractor thought downtown Kansas City needed some more construction. Although I guess it's possible that he sees the city through the distorting lens of general contracting. I talked to some scientists this morning, and they said that downtown Kansas City could definitely benefit from additional science, improved science curricula in schools and reminded me to use science three times daily. So their perspective was definitely colored by science.

Driver only carries $20 -- IN AMMUNITION!!!! So, car dealership Max Motors in Butler, Missouri, is offering buyers $250 in gasoline or a free semi-automatic handgun, and KMBC Channel 9 wants you to be all worried about it. For God's sake, it's not like they're teaching car buyers how to do fancy cowboy twirlies with the trigger guard. According to some refrigerator magnets my gun-owning grandpa displayed on his fridge right at little kid eye-level, I know an armed society is a polite society and that the West wasn't won with a registered gun, so despite my leftist leanings, my embrace of Karl Marx and my outright hostility to the United $tate$ of Amerikkka, I really have no problem with distributing guns to car buyers. What can I say? I'm a complicated man. For instance, I've somehow managed to reconcile my feminist sympathies with my patronage of illegal massage businesses. All that Ayn Rand I read in college sure comes in handy for convenient rationalizations.

Fox 4 Headline Writers, WTF? The headline writers at WDAF FOX 4 have apparently been replaced by naughty British schoolboys. A story about allergy season runs with the hed "Home Sick: Ew, Gross. Are You Breathing Poop?" But the Benny Hill Award for Excellence in Reporting goes to "Oh Yum. Woman Bites Off, Swallows Husband's Phalange." Don't mistake the dirty-sounding word "phalange" for a euphemism for "weiner," or you're playing right into the butt-scented hands of the Fox 4 writing staff. "Phalange" is actually the scientific term for "ballsack."

Smoking is cool as Kim Deal: Anyone who knows me knows that I'm an outspoken advocate for juvenile tobacco consumption. So it really makes me angry when girly British robots spread misinformation to children about the obvious benefits of smoking. Kids: First of all, it really does make you look awesome and grown-up. When I see a ten-year-old smoking cigarettes, my first thought is, "Is that young man an insurance salesman? I've been meaning to kick up my accidental death and dismemberment coverage." Secondly, tobacco is all natural. It's actually a leaf! So smoking cigarettes is like inhaling a rich, satisfying salad. Some scientists say people aren't getting enough salad. Anyway, I think this scene is from The Empire Strikes Back. It took place during the sequence on the Bespin cardboard box factory: